


Refuge of the Damned

by cordeliadelayne



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Book 6: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Getting Together, Happy Ending, M/M, failure at seduction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-19
Updated: 2015-09-19
Packaged: 2018-04-21 10:36:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4825880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cordeliadelayne/pseuds/cordeliadelayne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lupin's attempt at seduction doesn't work the way he thought it would; but he still gets the guy in the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Refuge of the Damned

**Author's Note:**

> Written for kiana who gave the prompt "notice". Set after HBP. Originally posted to Livejournal in 2006.

Severus Snape stood outside the little cottage in the woods and read the note on the door for the fifth time.

“Fair is foul and foul is fair  
Enter he of the flaxen hair  
A special treat waits for him  
With the strength of will to come within.”

Snape stared at the awful poetry for several minutes, his mouth opening and closing as he silently read the note. He could not believe that the poem was meant for him, he hoped the poem was not meant for him, and yet Lupin had owled him to come here at this time. Or had he? Snape took out the note that had arrived that morning and read it over again. It certainly looked like Lupin's writing, and it matched the writing of the poem...if you could call it that...

“Oh for the love of Merlin! Severus, are you going to come in? I’ve been standing behind this door for fifteen minutes!”

Severus blanched slightly. Had he really been standing here so long?

“Yes, you have!” Remus called in a decidedly smug singsong voice.

Severus turned on his heels and began to walk away.

“Don’t you dare!” Remus screamed through the door. Severus halted as if You-Know-Who himself had summoned him.

“Are you going to come in or just stand there?” Remus asked more quietly now, the door still closed. Snape hated the fact that Lupin could now read him so well and seriously considered not responding and merely walking away but, damn it, he couldn’t. He would only have to face Lupin's puppy dogs eyes at another point.

“What do you want?”

The door opened with a creak. “You coming inside would be a good start. Really, Severus, do you have to make everything so difficult?”

Snape slowly turned around to face the other man. It had been ten months since the end of Voldemort and three since they had last seen each other, at the Malfoy family trial. Lupin's hair seemed greyer somehow and there were more fine lines around his eyes and mouth, not to mention the jagged scar around his neck where Wormtail had tried to strangle him. Remus took Snape’s hand and gently led him into the cottage.

As soon as they were inside Snape let go of Lupin’s hand as if it burned and looked around, making careful note of the location of the doors and windows. Lupin sighed but didn’t say anything, instead spelling the front door locked and turning the kettle on. “Tea?”

Snape nodded, still standing by the door, his one good arm ready to pull out his wand if necessary.

“Severus...this place is unplottable. We’re perfectly safe here.”

“Safe?” Severus laughed though it came out slightly more hysterical than he had planned. “Nowhere is safe.”

Remus pretended not to hear; he wasn’t about to rehash that old argument. Instead he pressed a mug of tea into Snape’s hand and gestured for him to sit down on the bedraggled sofa. Snape did so, though he didn’t look happy about it.

“What was the point of that poem on the door?”

“Well, I had planned on seducing you but it doesn’t seem to be going very well.”

Snape snorted.

They sat in silence for a few moments; it wasn’t companionable and yet it wasn’t hostile either. Remus took some comfort in the heat from his own mug of tea and tried to will his legs from shaking. It would never do to show how nervous he was to Snape, but then again, by the way Snape’s eyes were boring into him, he could probably tell him the colour of his underwear.

“Lupin, I don’t have all day.”

“Really?” asked Lupin, sceptically. Since the last trial Snape was if not a prisoner, at least someone of interest to the authorities.

“Touché.”

Lupin smiled at the twitch to Snape’s mouth. “I told you...”

“Yes, yes, seduction, I heard you the first time.” He put his mug down on the table. “Well?”

“Well...what?”

“Are you going to start seducing me or should I go out and come back in again?”

“Severus...”

“No? Perhaps I should start stripping...”

“Oh for Merlin’s sake Severus will you stop it.” Lupin grimaced. It couldn’t be going any worse than if Harry had decided to floo in. “I just...after the...” Even after all these years it still startled Lupin when a single phrase could turn Snape’s face ashen and the heat of the room was sucked out in the fire of his magic. Easy to forget just how powerful Snape was now, how much of Voldemort’s magic he and Harry had absorbed in that fateful battle.

_Harry and Voldemort, wands drawn, Harry failing fast. Death Eaters running in all directions, Aurors standing stock still, knowing their only hope lay in the battle before them. The Order of the Phoenix standing in a circle around Harry and Voldemort. Dragons flying overheard. Snape appearing from nowhere. Harry being pinned against a wall. McGonagall’s gasp as she realised Voldemort was going to win. The desperate look of fear on Snape’s face as he lifted his wand and pointed it straight at Voldemort. “Legilimens”. The ear-splitting, heart-rending scream as Voldemort’s magic was torn from his body. The utter look of horror on Hermione’s face as she realised what had happened. Harry and Snape dropping like stones to the floor, unmoving. The explosion. Months of waiting for one of them to wake._

“Severus...” Lupin tried again, hesitantly, unsure whether those memories had come unbidden to his mind or if Snape had brought them there. “I didn’t...”

The room was still too icy, too still. Snape’s eyes too red flecked.

“I don’t think I should have come here.” Snape stood then and the heat rushed back into the room.

“I...Severus...don’t...” Remus stood on shaky legs. He didn’t know what he wanted, why he’d asked Snape here. He’d thought, somehow, that the notice outside would have broken the ice somehow, that all Severus needed was a gentle push in his direction.

“It was one kiss, Remus, not a lifetime declaration.”

And there he went again, surprising the werewolf. “But what if I want a declaration?” The words slipped out of him before he could grab them back. Snape’s eyes narrowed.

“You don’t.” Snape’s hands went to the door. If he left now, he wasn’t coming back.

“What if I told you I was in..."

There was an awkward pause. Lupin had been so sure that Snape would interrupt him before he got that far that he couldn’t help but choke on the word “love”. When Snape turned around to face him all he saw were eyes full of disappointment.

“I don’t even have to say the words any more, you know.”

Lupin’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Words?”

“I could obliviate you with a single thought. Have this whole conversation evaporate.”

Lupin blanched. “I’d rather you didn’t...embarrassing as it has been.” Snape didn’t seem to hear him, or didn’t care what he was saying.

“I could tear you limb from limb and put you back together again just by blinking. Sometimes...sometimes I can hear what Harry is thinking...Sometimes I think I can hear Him too.”

Lupin opened his mouth and then closed it again. “Have you talked to...” Harry “...anyone about this?”

“I don’t have any confidantes these days. They’d only lock me away in Azkaban and I can’t go there. It was only a kiss Lupin, but it made the magic dim, for a little while.”

_Lupin had been furious at Snape that day at the Malfoy’s trial. The Wizarding World was beginning to understand what Snape had done for them and he was going to ruin it. Ruin everything._

_“I don’t understand this damn loyalty you have for Malfoy...”_

_“It isn’t about loyalty, Lupin. I was loyal to Dumbeldore...and look where that got him.”_

_“Dumbledore didn’t kill innocents.”_

_“Didn’t he? I suppose there could be an argument...”_

_And then before he knew what he was doing, why he was doing it, Lupin had pushed Snape up against the wall and was kissing him, hard. And god it had felt so good, their bodies flush against each other, their tongues licking and being sucked and bitten, and he hadn't cared that they were in the Ministry and that anyone could walk out and see them, all that had mattered was Snape’s arm pulling him close, his legs spreading to give Lupin better access. All that anger he’d felt that morning had settled in his stomach as pure, uncomplicated lust._

The memory washed over him and this time he knew that Snape had planted it there, that it was the only way Snape knew to say that he wanted this too, that he needed. And so Lupin reached out and pulled Snape close to him, finding his mouth and kissing him with all his might. He’d been dreaming about this moment for days and realised, as Snape’s teeth worried at the scar on his neck, that Snape had done that too. Snape had wanted to make sure that Lupin really wanted him and when Lupin had woken up to damp sheets and Snape’s name on his lips, he had been sure.

“I’ve wanted you for so long,” Snape groaned as he pushed Lupin down to the floor and began to undo his trousers. Lupin looked up surprised and for a moment he thought he saw a flash of red in those dark orbs before Snape blinked. “Always watching you, always wanting to be inside of you.”

Lupin shuddered then, god how he needed Snape inside him right now. “Please...” he moaned as his shirt was ripped from him and Snape’s mouth found his nipples, and laid a wet trail down his stomach. He arched up to the touch and felt Snape’s hands upon his shoulders, steadying him, but when he felt Snape pulling off his trousers and his underwear he realised it wasn’t Snape himself, but his magic that was thrumming over his body, finding all the spots that made him melt. And then he felt himself prepared and Snape slip inside of him and he could feel age-old magic connecting with his own as Snape moved in and out, his mouth on Lupin’s neck, sucking and biting. But Lupin could feel his mind now, inside and out, and it felt like hundreds of hands stroking and pinching and scratching, and Snape’s cock was ramming into him and he could feel what Snape felt as his body closed around him, could feel Snape’s orgasm building until it washed over him and then his own orgasm took him and Snape by surprise. To feel himself and Snape coming like that was more than his mind could take. And so he drifted into sleep as his body spasmed uncontrollably underneath Snape.

+++++++++++++

It was nightfall when Lupin woke to find himself in his own bed and Snape’s whispers in the air. Still groggy he didn’t try to move but concentrated on Snape’s voice, deciding finally that he wasn’t talking to himself but to someone in the fire. Now if only he could focus.

“You were right about him...” An icy hand slipped itself around Lupin’s heart. “I do...care for him”. Lupin gasped but Snape didn’t seem to hear. “And it worked...I can still feel the magic but I can’t feel Him anymore...I’m sure he did. The Old Bastard never did understand love...There's no need to be insufferable about it, Miss Granger. Good night.”

Snape’s bones creaked as he stood up and moved away from the fire. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance you didn’t hear that, is there?”

Lupin opened his eyes and looked up to see a surprisingly happy looking Snape peering down at him. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“What if it hadn’t worked and I didn’t really lo-ike you? You would have been devastated.”

“Since when have you cared...”

Snape silenced him with a kiss. “I don’t. But you would.”

“You manipulated me,” Lupin pouted, trying to sit up and discovering aches where he didn’t know he had places.

“I’ve been manipulating you since the day we met.”

There wasn’t really anything Lupin could say to that, except... “Are you not going to ask how I feel about you?”

Snape hesitated. “It doesn’t really matter. He-Who-Shall-Never-Be-Resurrected is gone completely and I retain his power. It was only my love he needed to feel, no one elses.” He looked down at Lupin with hooded eyes. “I should be...”

“You’re not going anywhere.” Lupin pulled Snape down next to him. “Because I love you too.”

“You do realise I won't be saying that to you for a very long time?” Snape asked, even whilst he settled himself against Lupin’s chest.

“I can wait.”


End file.
